It Took Only a Week
by BlueRubyBeat
Summary: One young woman was experiencing one of the worst nights of her life. She was captured a week previous and tortured mentally before finally succumbing to death. She wanted to live, for herself and her family, but there was little she could do to change the outcome of her story. The woman only escaped from her captors by greeting death.


**It Took Only a Week**

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling does.

 **AN:** Captain of the Tutshill Tornados for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition - Round 11

 **Prompt:** Write about a horror-themed story on a winter night(s).

 **Word Count:** 2,853 words

 **~.~**

A cool winter's night never looked so beautiful. Snow was lightly falling creating a foot of snow. The snow blanked the canvas and purified the ground with its white color. Anyone could just sit by their window with a blanket wrapped around them and a cup of steaming cocoa in their hands, just watching the snow fall. It was such a beautiful sight, and for many it was just that, but for some it was their worst nightmare.

One such young woman was experiencing one of the worst nights of her life. She was captured a week previous and tortured mentally before finally succumbing to death. She wanted to live, for herself and her family, but there was little she could do to change the outcome of her story. The woman only escaped from her captors by greeting death.

 **~.~**

Michelle Bones, a muggle, was happily married to Daniel Bones. She loved her husband even though he was different from her, he was a wizard. She did not mind as she loved him for his personality, dashing features and his ability to make her laugh in any situation; although the last bit got them in a fair amount of trouble when they were courting. After their marriage she found she was pregnant with a girl, whom she named Susan.

Her Susan was a little over one years old and a very active and happy baby. She just loved her daughter so much and could not bear the thought of her daughter being hurt from the war her husband talked about. It was a dark time for the Wizarding World with a monster going by the name of Lord Voldemort or as she was told to call him, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

Michelle was a stay at home mother while her husband worked in the Wizarding Ministry. She would worry everyday while he was out working, on whether on not he would come home safe. Her husband kept out the gory details of their war and only told her enough on who to avoid. She had no other family, so the Bones' family was all she had left.

Every night Michelle would pray that her family be kept safe and every day her prayer was heard until one night their luck had run out. She and her husband had a date night and requested her sister-in-law, Amelia, to watch their darling daughter for them. It was lucky her child was out of the house otherwise her life would have been cut short before she would have been able to live it.

"Daniel Bones! You knock it off this instant!" Michelle yelled at her husband, with a laugh slipping out at the end.

"But why?" Daniel asked before snatching his wife and holding his arms around her stomach. He whispered in her ear, "I just love holding you like this. Why can't I hold my lovely wife?"

Michelle giggled, it had been so long since she let her fear go and basked in the carefree moment. She turned around and placed her arms around his neck. With a smile, she gave him a peck on the lips.

They were both too caught up in the moment to notice that the wards were being carefully worked on. After some light banter between the couple, the wards crashed and Daniel pushed his wife away from him to retrieve his wand.

"Daniel what's going on?" Michelle asked scared.

Daniel gave her a kiss and one last hug before pushing her to the back of the house, as he noticed the intruders were in the front.

"Go Michelle. Run out the back door and don't look back. I love you." Daniel said, his tone sorrowful, knowing he would not make it out of his house alive.

"I love you Daniel." Michelle stated tearfully before turning to the back to escape.

A sob escaped her lips as she ran to the back. She could hear angry shouts from her husband and men she did not know behind her. Upon reaching the back door, she fiddled with the locks before opening it and leaped outside into the freezing snow. She only ran a few steps before she crashed into something hard. She fell back onto the cold, hard ground and looked up at a man with a skull mask and black robes. A scream left her throat before a bright red light knocked her out.

 **~.~**

 **The next day**

Michelle woke up to a killer headache and a freezing floor. Her eyes snapped open in fear as she remembered the moments before her world turned black. She looked around and noticed she was in a cell with a bucket, everything was dirty from fluids she did not want to know. Looking down at herself, she noticed her shoes were missing and her dress was slightly dirty from laying in the filth of the cell.

"Hey…hey you…" Someone whispered to her.

She turned her head to the right and saw another person whispering to her from their cell. The only thing separating her from other people were bars, not walls, so she could see in all the cells surrounding her.

Michelle turned her attention back to the person whispering to her. "Where am I?"

The man in the cell next to her whispered back, "Don't talk so loud. You don't want them to come down here." After seeing her nod, the man continued. "We were captured by Death Eaters."

Michelle's eyes widened in horror. Her husband told her stories about innocent people take prisoner by Death Eaters and none ever survived. Almost all their prisoners bodies always wound up somewhere to be found, and they weren't always in one piece either. She feared for her life and that of her husband's.

"Shhh…keep it down." The man whispered more frantically as she started sobbing.

To muffle her sobs, she placed her palms over her mouth. She closed her eyes tightly while tears trailed down her cheeks. Michelle couldn't help but cry her heart out at the thought of being at the mercy of Death Eaters as well as cruel thoughts of what happened to her husband. Once her train of thought passed her imminent torture, her mind immediately circled to her baby daughter. She would never hold her, play with her, give her hugs and kisses, or watch her grow up to be a beautiful young woman.

Hours passed before her tears dried up, leaving tear trails along her cheeks and puffy red eyes. Michelle stared blankly at the ceiling of her cell, not really thinking of anything. A small pebble hit the side of her head, breaking her concentration. With confusion, she turned her head back to the man in the next cell.

"You done?" He whispered. "I need information girly."

Michelle sat up and scooted closer to the bars, but not close enough that the man could touch her.

"Who's winning the war? Does anyone know we're here?" He asked, gripping the bars between them tightly.

Michelle shook her head. "I don't know. My husband never told me about it. I'm sorry."

He growled lowly and hit his forehead against the bars. She moved her head back in surprise.

"What will they do to me?" She asked him.

The man laughed cruelly. "Well, they might rape you. It doesn't matter on the gender, depending on who wants a piece of you. Or they will torture mentally or physically with curses or muggle objects. Or all three girly."

Michelle clasped her hands to her chest. Her body was shaking as she whispered, "No…"

"Yes…I don't have long but they'll play with you for at least a week. Their victims don't last long." He answered her, his sympathy out the window.

Before the man could continue, a stream a light curled around them. Michelle turned her attention away from the man to the opening where the light came through. Three figures appeared in long robes. Their figures were indistinguishable as they wore the customary Death Eater outfits.

"Here…they…come…" She heard next to her, she turned her head as the man she was speaking to suddenly burst into cackles. He had clearly lost it in that moment. She saw hysteria burning bright in his eyes as he kept laughing and laughing.

The Death Eaters walked in front of the mans cell. One opened the door, then let the other two in before walking in last. The prisoner stopped laughing and abruptly tried to attack the nearest Death Eater. He was thwarted with a body bind spell and collapsed hard onto the ground.

Michelle scooted back against the wall of her cell and couldn't help but watch through the bars. The Death Eaters showed no mercy to the man she was talking to. He was right, his time was up. She watched as he screamed and begged for mercy, even though he knew it wouldn't come. The Death Eaters started with their favorite curse, the Cruciatus Curse, before moving onto muggle torture. She couldn't see the faces of her captors but knew they were smiling cruelly behind their skull masks, as they started cutting the tendons on the prisoner. The one doing the cutting must have been some sort of doctor, or healer as her husband mentioned.

It was a terrible sight to watch but she couldn't keep her eyes away, not only because it was horrible, but his screams kept her from closing her eyes. She tried to give him some comfort that he wouldn't die alone, but his eyes seemed unfocused and unseeing. Michelle couldn't tell if he knew she was there or not but she hoped he did not feel alone as he slowly and painfully died.

The Death Eaters were laughing as they carved the prisoner up. Once the tendons were cut, they just went crazy and cut him open like a medical examiner did on a torso during an autopsy. They spelled his chest to keep open, then used the cutting curse to cut his rib cage. The man was somehow still alive, and screaming in agony all the while. Michelle kept watching as they spelled his guts to rip out and splatter on the ground, the wall, and through the bars separating their cells. She almost threw up as some entrails fell close to her.

The man finally stopped screaming and heaved as if trying to catch his breath, which he likely was as his lungs were the last organ to be ripped from his body. Michelle watched as his body convulsed for a few moments before going completely still. She couldn't help but let the tears flow down her cheeks in sorrow. Her widened eyes never left his now cooling corpse. She didn't even notice the Death Eaters leave his cell and out the dungeon.

 **~.~**

Michelle didn't know how long it was since the Death Eaters left her alone. It felt like an eternity as she watched the corpse of a man she knew for only a few hours cool to the touch. The stench of his dead body permeated the air causing her to throw up what little her stomach didn't digest from her last meal.

She sat with her legs against her torso and arms wrapped around herself to bring comfort and peace of mind. It didn't work, so she started thinking of her family, which only made her tear up at the thought of never seeing their smiling faces again.

 **~.~**

Three days they left her with the dead prisoner. Three days she watched rats come out of the cracks from the walls to munch on his body. Her stomach grumbled from the lack of food and the only things to eat were the corpse and the rats. Neither option sounded pleasant. The only source to comfort to her complaining stomach was the dripping water in the corner of her cell. At least she wouldn't be left thirsty, but she had to drink it quick otherwise the water would turn to ice. The frigid weather leaked into the dungeon from outside, causing the dripping water and the blood to freeze into ice.

Her stomach moaned in hunger, if only she could eat. Her eyes trailed back to the rat infested corpse. A shaky hand moved as if to grab something before she pulled it back with a strong, "No!"

"No! I cannot. Cannibalism is wrong! Eating the rats would kill me…" Michelle whispered to herself. Her body shook slightly, whether from the cold air or the lack of food, she didn't know.

Was this how she would die? From starvation? Or did the monsters that captured her hope she would resort to animalistic behavior? She honestly didn't know anymore. The more she sat alone with her thoughts, the more her mind broke piece by piece. The Death Eaters didn't have to do anything to her, her mind was breaking her all on its own.

 **~.~**

Another two days passed by. She had been in the cell for a total of five days by now. The corpse she kept eyeing was pretty much bones and scraps by now. The rats did a number on him and they looked full and content. She was oh so close to succumbing to her desires to fill her stomach, but she relented at the last possible moment. She got so far as to grab a small chunk of flesh, red gleaming from the moonlight on the piece and ready to be placed in her mouth. Before the piece could fall into her waiting mouth, she snapped out of her trance and threw the flesh across the room. Her hands shook and her face morphed into revulsion.

"How could I? I almost…" Michelle quietly spoke, she was at a loss for words at her actions.

She looked down at her hand where some blood was left on her palm and fingers and freaked. Quickly she moved to the dripping water and placed her hand under it to clean off the blood. The drips of water wouldn't drop fast enough so she improvised and rubbed her hand against the wall, scratching her hand horribly from the stone.

"There…it's gone…like it never happened," Michelle whispered to herself as she gazed down at her torn hand with a slight smile.

 **~.~**

Two more days of hell passed. The Death Eaters wouldn't come visit her and she was terribly lonely and hungry. Her last chance to even eat some type of meat was gone, the rats scurried away from her vicinity once all the scraps of human were eaten.

Michelle had taken to talking to herself. Once that wore out, she crawled to the bars separating the two cells and grabbed the skull of the male prisoner. She couldn't bring the skull to her side since the bars were too close together, but her arm could fit through to move the skull as if it were talking. She pretended the man was alive and they were having conversations.

Her mind was almost broken and insane. She still had some sanity left, since she had not taken to eating herself to fill her stomach.

"Nice cold weather we're having Mister Skull. Isn't that right?" Michelle said to the skull.

"Why yes. My bones are shaking from the cool air." The skull answered. "Why look at them move."

Michelle turned her gaze to the bones, she couldn't believe her eyes as she saw the bones shake.

"Amazing!" She commented in wonder. She didn't notice it was a Death Eater in front of her cell swish his wand to make the bones move. He clearly enjoyed her insanity.

She finally took note of a shadow of a man across the cell floor. Turning her head, along with the skull's, they looked at the intruder.

"Why hello there, why are you bothering me and Mister Skull?" Michelle asked in a nonchalant voice.

"I have a little present for you darling," the Death Eater laughed.

"For me? Did you hear that Mister Skull? I got a present!" She got excited as she moved her head to talk face to face with the skull.

As she turned her head away, the Death Eater opened the door to her cell and threw something large onto the floor.

Hearing the thump, Michelle turned back to the door and looked down. Her eyes widened and the skull slipped from her hand to the floor with a loud crack. In front of her was the decaying body of her husband.

"DANIEL!" She screamed in horror.

Her breath was caught and her brain went into overdrive. Her mind kept repeating 'Daniel', over and over again. The last piece of her mind was shredded and she was lost to the world. The dead man was right about the Death Eaters, it took only a week to break her, and they didn't even have to touch her.

Michelle was too caught up in her tortured mind to notice the Death Eater raise his wand. The last thing that happened in that cell were two spoken words and a flash of green light.

 **~.~**


End file.
